On Wednesday, the papers hit the street with the AP story about Hillary’s pay-for-play scheme at the State Department. Some carried the news many others didn’t.

It was headline news on any real news outlet in this country. The New York Post headlined “Dough Nations.” Conversely, the MSN news site on my windows phone carried five negative Trump articles and no mention of the Hillary story at all.

Politico writes that the Clinton campaign will run out the clock on these matters rather than address them directly. This strategy is founded in a genuine belief by Hillary that she has done nothing wrong and will no longer address the issue. Much of the media (especially the electronic media) has happily followed suit.

The fact that many the heads of media outlets and on-air personalities were donors to the Clinton Foundation and then sought time to see her when she was Secretary of State should not be beside the point. Media is big business and, not surprisingly, most are all in for Clinton this cycle.

Some of the donations were as high as seven figures.

The delusional belief by law-breaking public officials that in fact they have done nothing wrong (and cannot be touched for it) is an endemic sickness in the region of Hillary’s birth – Chicago.

My opponent in my first election in 1994, Dan Rostenkowski had decades of service to Chicagoans in Congress and, because of that, he believed that the rules did not apply to him.

He was eventually convicted of having laundered campaign money into his personal accounts and used his public office to pay for parts of his campaign. The amounts were never very much – rarely rising above a few thousand. But his manifest belief that he thought that he was entitled to break the rules for his own benefit cost him at the polls – and in front of a jury.

He is famous for going to prison rather than admitting that he was just plain wrong. The US Attorney offered to let him off if he would return the money and not seek reelection. He passed believing that the people would never punish him for this behavior – he was entitled after all.

A few years later, the guy who defeated me for in Congress went to jail as well. Rod Blagojevich was “entitled” to sell the vacant US Senate seat of then-President-elect Barack Obama.

The transcript of his telephone call regarding this matter was infamous for its profanity, cupidity and an indefatigable belief that he “owned” the seat and it was appropriate for him to offer it to the highest bidder. He devoutly believed that this was a perk of his office and that he did nothing wrong.

He is still in prison and will be there for a while to come.

The list of convicted Alderman, prosecutors, Committeeman and almost countless other officials in Chicago is replete with similar stories. These “public servants” eventually grew (and still grow) so comfortable with their position and the fact that Chicago is a one-party region insuring their retention that they believe that they are entitled to behave as they please – they have earned it.

Hillary’s attitude is identical. As Secretary of State the rules did not apply to her. Her past service makes her an exception to and above the law. She is special, don’t ya know.

The one difference between Hillary and those mentioned above is that the administration of justice used to be blind and affected all of us equally – including Rosty and Rod. Now, even justice bends over backward for those in favor. Hillary actually IS untouchable. Rosty would have been proud! The Chicago system is finally perfected – all it needed was a US Justice Department willing to wink and some influence sold to the national media.

In many ways, we live in a Banana Republic.

The press was not all-in for the convicts then, though. They had a high bar to cross before the press would cover the story but, once crossed, they reported it honestly and directly. In fact, the uber-liberal Sun Times was the paper that published the pictures of “King Tut’s Tomb.” These were photos of “Rosty’s” basement where piles of loot from the House Gift Shop were stored later to be distributed to worthy campaign workers.

Today, certain members of the press will not carry the Hillary story under any circumstances. They have no conscience at all about violating the basic tenets of their privileged status by hiding all they see as unsafe for “their” candidate.

They have crossed over from neutral observers to all-in partisans – not merely to the extent that they promote one candidate over another but to actually hiding and shaping parts of the news to affect the election. Their First Amendment privileges were never intended to protect this behavior.

We just have to hope that the people can get the news in spite of the press burying it. This is the real challenge to the Trump campaign: Not merely defending himself from the press but doing both his job as a candidate and the job of the “working” press as well.